eli5: How do ‘Sleeper Agents” work?
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From what I understand, it is a spy or saboteur who is planted in a country and who lives as a normal citizen until “activated” for an undercover mission.
A sleeper agent is a spy who is placed within a target country or organization where they live and work undercover for extended periods of time, usually years, before being activated to carry out their mission. They may be placed there by their own government (as in the case of double agents) or by a foreign government.
They are are a thing because their long-term cover gives them time to build trust and gather information that can be used against their target. They can also be used to carry out sabotage or other disruptive activities.
They usually have strict orders and are only to be activated under specific circumstances. They may be activated by a phone call, email, or other type of communication from their handler.
A sleeper agent is an agent who doesn’t do any actual spy work for a long period of time, like years or decades. This agent spends their time living a normal life, cultivating important relationships and making a career, preferably in an area like defense, diplomacy etc. Since they never do any spy work, they don’t get caught, and this allows them to get to really important positions deep and high in their field, with considerable access to information, resources and decision-making. Then, possibly decades later, they can be activated by their actual foreign country to a disastrous effect.
Imagine someone who just gets to a country. They start work, build a life. Nothing out of the ordinary. Even if surveilled perfectly, you’d never find them doing anything suspicious because they don’t do anything else than living their life. You cannot differentiate between a normal person and a sleeper agent. Then one day, they get a signal. Suddenly, they start doing spy stuff. Or terrorism. Or whatever else they are told to do. The difference between a sleeper agent and someone simply infiltrating a company etc would mainly be that the sleeper agent doesn’t know what to do until he gets told. He can’t give himself away, because he simply wouldn’t know how.
This isn’t like them suddenly waking up from hypnosis. They know full well they are agents and will try to get into positions that benefit them. But again, you cannot tell them from someone who is just ambitious. They may get into a job with classified information, but they never try and steal it. Until they suddenly do.
Sleeper agents are a huge investment, you basically sideline one of your agents for an extended period of time. Whenever they “wake up”, it better be for something relevant and big. It’s why sleeper agents are so feared, you can hardly tell them from normal people but when they get used it’s usually a big thing. It’s also a rare ish thing. At least as far as confirmed sleeper agents on public record go.
A great real-world example would be Russia’s [Illegals Program](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegals_Program) (Which the show *The Americans* is based on, although somewhat more sensationalized. Very few of those types of intelligence assets would be action-movie types. Their main job is to develop sources and gather intel, having a lot of time and leeway to be able to do so.
Now, not exactly spies per se, but there have historically been people who are “activated” by trigger events or orders. At the peak of the Cold War the concept of [“Stay Behind Forces”](https://www.fayobserver.com/story/news/military/2017/06/24/secrets-of-special-forces-unit-operating-in-cold-war-berlin/20416750007/) was quite common. These were typically Soldiers, but we could safely imagine a wide range applies to who makes that cut. Their job, if an area was captured by the Soviets, was to “stay behind” to organize resistance, carry out sabotage and demolition operations, and gather and send intelligence on enemy forces.
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